Sudent-police clashes end at Cairo University

Clashes between pro-Muslim Brotherhood students and police have calmed down after police fired teargas to prevent the protesters from demonstrating outside of Cairo University in Giza.

Seven students were arrested by security forces deployed around the campus gates, according to Al-Ahram's Arabic news website.

Students threw rocks at police, who fired large amounts of tear gas to disperse the protesters, reported a rights NGO which operates at Egyptian universities, Students According to the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression (AFTE).

AFTE announced via Twitter that some teargas canisters had been fired inside the campus.

The pro-Brotherhood demonstrators, known as "Students against the Coup," were protesting a recent police crackdown on student protesters at Al-Azhar University.

Fifty-eight people were injured on Monday at Al-Azhar during clashes between pro-Brotherhood students and security forces.

Two students have died in November's clashes with police at university campuses across Cairo – Mohamed Reda at Cairo University and Abdel-Ghany Mahmoud at Al-Azhar.

Engineering students at Cairo University have been staging a sit-in to demand accountability for the death of Reda, who had been studying in the same faculty.

Cairo University issued a statement blaming security forces for Reda's death. The Interior Ministry, however, has denied that security forces possess the type of birdshot that killed him.

Following similar clashes early in November, the Egyptian government issued a decree allowing police to enter campuses without prior authorisation from university administrators or Egypt's prosecution.

That same month, a misdemeanour court sentenced 12 university students to 17 years in prison over riots at Al-Azhar in October.

The students had stormed the headquarters of the Islamic institution - considered the oldest surviving seat of Sunni Islamic learning - and damaged property inside, in protest of Al-Azhar supporting the movement to oust Muslim Brotherhood president Mohamed Morsi.